Cactus Lamp

The Switch

A table lamp with a cactus as its switch. The cactus sits on a small concrete base, its spines exposed, wired directly into the circuit. To turn the light on or off, you have to place your hand on that surface.

We move through daily life accepting most of it without question. A switch is one of those things, pressed so often it stops registering as an action at all.

This lamp works against that. By placing a small resistance inside a familiar gesture, it brings the gesture back into view. The intention is not to make the object difficult to use, but to create one small hesitation, a brief pause in which something ordinary is seen freshly.